Daylight saving debate is not just about sunshine. It’s about consistency

Every year around about now, it happens. You can set your clock by it, though in Queensland, you don’t have to.

When our southern cousins woke up on Sunday morning and put their clocks forward one hour, they went back to the future. We left our clocks untouched, entrenching us an hour in the past.

It is nice to have extra time in the evenings, but that too has its drawbacks. Credit: James Alcock

And so the perennial debate resumes. Should Queensland introduce daylight saving?

On daylight saving itself, I am agnostic.

Sure, it’s nice in the afternoons, but for those of us who are not morning people, it’s a bit like Newton’s third law of physics – every action has an equal and opposite reaction.

In this case, every benefit has a drawback. Whether that’s equal and opposite is very much up to the individual.

The Aztec restaurant on Griffith Street in Coolangatta backs on to the NSW border.Credit: Matt Dennien

One thing I am less agnostic about is consistency – consistency between states and, importantly for those who live near the border, consistency within communities.

It defies logic that Griffith Street businesses at Coolangatta are in a different time zone to their customers, just metres away.

So when the question of whether daylight saving should be introduced in Queensland is asked, for me, the answer is a resounding “yes”.

It’s not about that extra hour of sunlight after the typical workday, nor is it about the extra time to finish off a post-school cricket match.

Uncertainty abounds when holding virtual business meetings across time zones.Credit: Istock

It’s about that connectivity, a common framework to bring us together as a nation, at least as far west as practicable.

I crave the certainty that a 1pm virtual business meeting with someone in Sydney or Melbourne is actually at 1pm and not midday.

There are very valid arguments against daylight saving, particularly in Queensland. Being closer to the equator, and much more decentralised than other states, there are legitimate concerns.

The sun rises, and sets, almost an hour later in some parts of this huge state.

While having the sun rise at 7.30am in the likes of Mount Isa is not ideal, such communities could adjust their business and school hours to suit themselves.Credit: Lydia Lynch

If Mount Isa observed daylight saving, the sun would rise on Wednesday at 7.21am – not ideal for work or school life.

But there is no requirement for school to start, or businesses to open, at 9am. For communities in the north and west, business and school hours could easily be adjusted. Farmers need not adjust at all.

Those communities could simply be given the freedom to set their hours of operation as they see fit. There would still be plenty of work-day overlap for intrastate commerce.

There is nothing convenient, or consistent, about a nation of 25 million people divided into five distinct time zones.

It’s a quirk of planning that has Adelaide, longitudinally to the west of Brisbane, half an hour ahead of Brisbane, despite the sun rising over the city of churches about 30 minutes after the first rays glisten off Moreton Bay.

It’s just nuts.

For commerce, convenience and connectivity, it makes sense to share a time zone with our fellow Australians to the south.

For that reason, I would be just as enthusiastic about NSW, Victoria, Tasmania and our nation’s capital doing away with daylight saving – just as long as we’re on the same page.

Queenslanders, of course, had their say in 1992, when 54.5 per cent of the voting population decided to abandon daylight saving after a three-year trial. South-east Queensland was overwhelmingly in favour of its retention.

Importantly, no Queenslander who is today under the age of 49 voted in that referendum.

Most of us have had this situation foisted upon us and have never had a say.

It’s time to reset that clock.

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